Miitomo: the social app that you kind of already have

Nintendo recently made their first foray into the mobile gaming market by releasing Miitomo. The concept of the Mii itself is nothing new as Nintendo gamers have been creating Mii avatars for years on Nintendo consoles such as the Wii and 3DS.

To play this game “successfully”, Miitomo encourages users to create their Mii and connect with their friends (and collect Miitomo coins in the process). Once you’ve created a Mii, you can answer a bunch of questions so that your friends and those you share with can get to know you. Like, “what did you do on the weekend” and “what’s your favorite food”? It’s almost as if you’re encouraged to divulge information about yourself with your social media world because they don’t see much of you in the real world. Sounds like the inherent disaffection of the internet.

Or Facebook.

It’s kind of like…virtual social media? But you already have that on Facebook and other forms of social media? It’s sort of like The Sims or Second Life, but without the actual gameplay. It’s just you (mii) sharing things with your friends (that they probably already know) but you’re doing it through this app. Also, you can dress up your mii because it’s cute?

Now I’m not being a hater (much) but Miitomo appears to take the triviality of social media and turn it into a game. But it’s not really a game, it’s a social app that looks like a game.

Here’s the official trailer to give you a better idea of what Miitomo is all about.